1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the recording of photographic images, and particularly to a photosensitive material capable of forming an image by bringing a photosensitive silver salt to act as a trigger and causing a change in stickiness by a pH value change corresponding to the change of a reducing agent into an oxidized product. It also relates to an image formation process using the photosensitive material, and an image formation apparatus using the same.
2. Related Background Art
An image formation process employing a dry process, utilizing the change of a reducing agent into an oxidized product upon forming a visible image, while bringing a photosensitive silver salt to act as a trigger, is disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 62-70836, etc. In such a process, a polymer image is formed by utilizing a difference between a reduced product (an unexposed portion) and an oxidized product (an exposed portion) in the action to inhibit vinyl monomers from being polymerized.
However, the above process of forming a polymer image contains a step of polymerizing vinyl monomers by heating, and hence has had the problems that image formation procedures are complicated and apparatus are made large in size. Moreover, the above process essentially requires the presence of vinyl monomers, but the vinyl monomers can not stay in a stable state in photosensitive materials over a long period of time, thus bringing about the problem that the stability of photosensitive materials is worsened with time.